David M. Weinberg

David M. Weinberg is a senior fellow at Misgav: The Institute for National Security & Zionist Strategy, and Habithonistim: Israel’s Defense and Security Forum. He also is Israel office director of Canada’s Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA). He has held a series of public positions, including senior advisor to deputy prime minister Natan Sharansky and coordinator of the Global Forum Against Anti-Semitism in the Prime Minister's Office. The views expressed here are his own. His diplomatic, defense, political, and Jewish world columns over the past 28 years are archived at www.davidmweinberg.com

Deri must be held accountable

The Meron disaster reflects a larger problem that Israel has with Haredi politics, in which Aryeh Deri is a key culprit. The Shas leader should be shamed out of Knesset.

 

The State of Israel long has faced an existential threat from Haredi separationist ideology. The tragedy in Meron, of which Haredi men were themselves the primary victims, is a painful demonstration of the dangers involved in continuing to ignore the roots of conflict between Israeli society and the Haredi public, and especially the rotten role of Haredi politicians in exacerbating the situation.

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Long before any committees of investigation issue their conclusions of criminal culpability or mere reckless disregard for the unnecessary loss of life at Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai's gravesite in Meron, one thing is patently clear: The root cause of the disaster lies in the aggressive assertion of autonomy by the Haredi community; autonomy from the broader Israeli world in everything from education and national service to coronavirus lockdowns and safety regulations.

Any time Israeli leaders seek to nudge the Haredi community, for its own good and for the good of the entire country, towards compliance with logical and necessary norms – like studying math, science, and civics; going to work; contributing to the national security burden; upholding building standards in their neighborhoods and health guidelines in their communities – Haredi politicians cry "gevalt."

They term such ideas as "czarist decrees" or "persecution," and then protest violently in the streets, claiming to be victims of a domineering and decadent secular leadership. In fact, it is the Haredi community that has become a dominant and all-powerful political force in this country. It is secular politicians who are afraid of Haredi political power, not the opposite. Alas, this has allowed Haredi politicians to carve out and protect an increasingly autonomous and ruinous society for themselves.

Everybody knows that had Meron been treated like any other site of mass gathering, like a music concert, soccer game, or political rally, police safety regulations would have limited attendance to ten or twenty thousand people. Never would have 100,000 people been allowed into the site, not to mention the 250,000 worshippers and revelers who have attended in previous years.

But who is going to dare try to impose such restrictions upon powerful Haredi politicians and their belligerent, often-anti-Zionist, rabbinical masters?

Shas leader Aryeh Deri is the ultimate expression of pugnacious Haredi power; a super-self-confidant politician who bulldozes overall legal, civic, and moral boundaries to "bolster" (read: enfeeble) his Haredi voting public. His brand of blithely sectorial, brusquely cynical politics is catastrophic.

Deri was one of the father figures of the Haredi world of dependency, of living off the dole. He was central to the creation of the all-encompassing government-support system for those studying in yeshiva; a system so comprehensive that it simply does not pay for a Kollel student to step out into the working world. He has never spoken positively about the higher education and professional training programs for the Ultra-Orthodox that have opened in recent years, nor has he said one word about the importance of increased participation of Haredi men in the army.

Deri can also be directly be blamed for turning late Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef away from his earlier path of religious and political moderation. He whispered wicked things into the rabbi's ears, as needed, about Religious Zionists, Russian, Reform Jews, and secular politicians. Deri was almost certainly the person who suggested that  Ovadia call Naftali Bennett's Habayit party the "Bayit [home] of Goyim," not the "Bayit of Jews."

Deri also was behind the infamous "Kochavit Giyur" (Dial-a-Conversion) advertising campaign that Shas ran in recent elections. This campaign smeared Russian immigrants as "counterfeit converts" and slandered Religious Zionist rabbis as liberal destroyers of conversion standards.

Deri spawned the failed "stinking maneuver" in 1990 which attempted to bring down the unity government led by Prime Minister Shamir and install a narrow Peres government instead. Then, Deri bought the Labor Party's support for the Haredi takeover of state religious enterprises (such as the Chief Rabbinate and religious courts) by backing the Oslo process – until the intifada made it too difficult for Shas voters to stomach this.

Deri will cut a deal with anyone of any background to get his candidate elected if it serves his momentary purpose – such as getting Moshe Lion elected as mayor Jerusalem. Deri collaborated with the oh-so-very-treif, staunchly anti-religious Russian party boss Avigdor Lieberman for this purpose.

I conjecture that Deri would sell every settler to the Saudis, twice over, if that were to earn Shas-affiliated schools a two percent budget increase.

The fact that Deri has been caught in criminal violations more than once and gone to jail has not stopped him; nor the fact that once again today he is facing new criminal indictments. He brushes this off by presenting himself as a persecuted Dreyfus and wronged Demjanjuk rolled into one, and as a holy man whose concern for the poor will bring salvation to the downtrodden of Israel.

WHICH BRINGS US to recent events. Deri led and defended the Haredi community's separatist and defiant response to the government's coronavirus restrictions, fiercely objecting in the cabinet to the application of the "red light" system of differential lockdowns. This, because hard-hit Haredi communities would be most affected, and he argued, would constitute "persecution of Haredi people." As a result, Prime Minister Netanyahu repeatedly imposed country-wide lockdowns – unnecessarily, unfairly, and to great harm.

Deri also defended the fact many Haredi schools stayed open throughout the lockdowns, while the rest of the country's children were forced to learn on Zoom.

Deri's successful attempts to "soften plan after plan" of the Health Ministry relating to the coronavirus pandemic continued into planning for the Lag BaOmer festivities in Meron.

According to Deri's longtime personal aide, Yosef Schwinger, Deri "fought like a lion" to have the event go ahead, despite Health Ministry warnings that it could be a coronavirus super-spreader event. (Guess what? Schwinger was appointed by Deri to lead the Religious Services Ministry's National Center for the Development of Holy Places, which has responsibility for Meron.) "Rabbi Deri deserves credit for saving the Lag BaOmer celebration from a more limited format," avowed Schwinger on the radio the day before the tragedy.

Religious Services Minister Yaakov Avitan of Shas also toured Meron before Lag BaOmer, and said he was "impressed by the comprehensive and professional preparation that is being made for the celebration." Avitan then profusely thanked Deri "for the efforts he has made in the face of various complications to enable the ascendance of many to Meron this year without any restrictions."

Deri himself went on the radio on Lag BaOmer morning to boast of his "achievement" and encourage anybody and everybody to participate in Meron festivities. "Bad things don't happen to Jews on religious pilgrimage," Deri pompously declared. "One should trust in Rabbi Shimon (Bar Yochai) in times of distress."

I think that neither the righteous and long-deceased Rabbi Shimon nor the much less righteous and hard-kicking Aryeh Deri can be relied upon to protect the Israeli public (including the Haredi public) from the many rash and reckless mistakes made in recent decades, as described above.

Deri should be slammed with responsibility for these criminal failures, especially the Meron misfortune, and be shamed out of politics.

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